


Doubt Truth to Be a Liar, but Never Doubt I Love

by Hihoneyimdead



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: After 159 but pre 160, Canon Compliant, Flirting, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Jon and Martin are Not Goth, Late Night Conversations, M/M, Not Beta Read, References to Hamlet, Self-Hatred, Self-Indulgent, Sharing a Bed, We Die Like Men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-30
Updated: 2019-11-30
Packaged: 2021-02-26 05:20:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,311
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21618250
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hihoneyimdead/pseuds/Hihoneyimdead
Summary: Jon is not a fan of Hamlet (the character) nor of Hamlet (the play). He is very clear about this.At two in the morning.Martin loves sleep. He also loves Jon very, very much. God, if only the two loves of his life could get along.
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan Sims
Comments: 13
Kudos: 211





	Doubt Truth to Be a Liar, but Never Doubt I Love

**Author's Note:**

> Attempt #6 of uploading this, hello!
> 
> I've never written Jon or Martin before this, but I did write an 8 page paper about how Hamlet is an asshole and, while revising said paper, realized some slight similarities. Naturally, they're sad. Naturally, Martin will have none of this. Naturally, I'm very tired.

“Hamlet,” Jon announces, impromptu at two in the morning. “is a bastard.”

Martin, who was contentedly asleep sprawled across the bed with Jon curled up on his front like a greasy little bastard of a cat just a moment ago, grunts and pats Jon’s head. “‘S’nice.”

“Like. A bastard. Complete asshole. God, he sucks.”

Two in the morning in Middle-of-Nowhere, Scotland, usually is habited by Jon up reading one of the few statements Basira managed to smuggle out for them down in the kitchen by candlelight like he’s in a damn Dickens novel, one of Martin’s jumpers pulled on and a cold cup of tea keeping him company as he ignores the need to sleep and reads stale nightmares over and over again in an attempt to do something stupid like not sleep. Maybe to try and satiate his appetite, which just keeps growing and growing as he refuses and refuses to go anywhere near the town. Not like it helps, anyway, seeing as he keeps waking Martin up with his stomach growling adorably and his eyes faintly glowing, unblinking, into the darkness of the bedroom as he whispers the stories of people long-dead. It’d be charming if it weren’t fucking creepy. 

Two in the morning, this morning, apparently consists of Jon lying on top of Martin and complaining about Shakespeare again (last Tuesday it was Julius Caesar himself.) And it’d be charming if it wasn’t two in the goddamned morning. When Martin should be asleep, because he does  _ not  _ want to be awake. Not at two in the morning. When he should be asleep. When they  _ both  _ should be asleep. 

“Where’s he come off treating his mum that way?” Jon demands, silent as the fornicating cows in the field nextdoor. He’d probably be quieter if he didn’t Know Martin was awake. 

“No clue,” Martin mumbles. He absently pats the back of Jon’s head, and his hand comes away slightly damp. He frowns. “You alright?”

“And Ophelia! Christ, what a monster. Why’s the audience supposed to be cheering for him anyway?”

“Jon?”

“Not to mention how much of an  _ asshole  _ he is in general, like, Jesus Christ, William, you can’t make your main hero an unlikeable prick.”

Martin frowns more, deeper, and the muscles pull  _ hard _ . So he stops frowning and goes back to the normal, day-to-day, vague smile, the one he’s had on his face since his dad left twenty-something years ago. The one he’s just gotten back after a good couple months slowly kicking his emotions out to the curb. He likes it, Jon is suspiciously bleh about it (suspicious because Jon’s into literally everything about Martin’s face, probably, based off how he’ll lie awake at night instead of sleeping and list everything he likes about Martin while Martin’s supposedly asleep.) It’s a good calming face. It kept his mum from screaming, usually, anyway, and keeps Martin from feeling the constant panic and anxiety and fear he should probably be feeling, like, all the time. Probably not healthy. Huh. Two in the morning thoughts. Neat. Shut up, two in the morning thoughts, it’s Jon Time now. 

He sits up, just a bit, just enough to sort of somewhat see Jon’s face, and he tries not to yawn. He fails. Jon yawns back, and it’s adorable as ever, and Martin is just sleepy enough to get completely caught up in it because maybe Jon doesn’t look as guarded as he usually does and maybe he reminds Martin of a kitten when he yawns. And Martin  _ loves  _ kittens, and he  _ really fucking loves  _ Jon. 

“His only friends are Rosencrantz, Guildenstern, and Horatio,” Jon says, eyes wide, and, right. Right, yeah. “And even then, he sends two of them off to their deaths without a thought just to save his own skin.”

“Do I need to go make tea?” Martin yawns, because it is two in the morning. Two-oh-five in the morning. Too early, but not too early for tea. Never too early for tea. 

It’s never too early for tea in this house. Cottage. Whatever. Sometimes Martin’s up not sleeping and trying to remember the joy in writing terrible, beautiful poetry. Most of the time Jon is up doing literally everything but sleep. Sometimes Martin dreams of endless fog and cold and the sea and Peter Lukas’ smile, old and salt-stained and fake as hell. Jon always dreams of things he never talks about but cries over while he thinks Martin isn’t awake next to him trying to project comfort. And sometimes both of them dream about the worms, or about the fog, or about Elias-slash-Jonah Magnus finding them and scooping Jon up and doing that crown thing Jon sometimes mentions when he’s in a particularly despondent mood. 

Jon takes so long answering that Martin wonders if he’s fallen asleep, just like that, and he’s about to lie back down himself and start his meditative exercises back up again when Jon says, “I think Daisy’s dead.”

And Martin tries not to sound annoyed as he sighs, he really does, but he also is recovering from a months-long stint as Annoyed Asshole Martin, so he mostly fails. Mostly because it is two-fifteen in the morning. And because they’ve  _ talked about this, Jon, I know you can hear me _ . 

Jon winces. “Sorry.”

And Martin winces. “No, I’m- I’m sorry. What’s this about Daisy being dead?”

Martin didn’t know Daisy that well while she was at the Institute. Before the Unknowing, he avoided her and maybe hid in Jon’s office while Jon wasn’t there to snap at him for hiding in his office. After she and Jon crawled out of that damn coffin, Martin was too busy trying to figure out what Peter was doing, and then he just...didn’t care. But Basira was alone when she came to help Martin home, and Basira and Daisy were, like, always together. Always. Maybe even Together with a capital ‘T’. Hell if Martin knows, he was too busy hating everyone and being Lonely to really care. 

But Basira was alone. And Daisy hasn’t shown up to claim her safehouse back. 

“I don’t- ” Jon lets out a breath, rolls off Martin and onto his back and stares up at the ceiling. “During the attack, I ran off and left Basira and Daisy to deal with the Hunters and the...the thing that isn’t Sasha. I didn’t want to but I did, and, well-”

Martin props himself up on his elbows and vaguely frowns down at him, too tired to really do anything else. “Wait, what? Was this while I was…”

“In the Lonely, yes, and when I came out with you…”

Jon trails off, and Martin knows. Almost Knows with a capital ‘K’. He was mostly there for that bit: stumbling through the tunnels back up to the Institute, being yanked away by a very dazed-looking Basira, pointedly ignoring the blood spatter in the halls going to the back entrance. Just Basira. But Martin was tired, very tired, and kept accidentally stepping back into that fog, and Jon was doing his damnedest to keep him steady. 

Martin swallows something (hell if he knows what, he barely remembers any emotions, even two weeks out) and lies there for a moment. Then he sighs again and flops back down, probably making Jon bounce a bit. Whatever, it’s two in the morning. 

“Have you tried doing your…” Martin fumbles a bit and gestures a vague oval around his eyes. “Thingy? Eye thing? Beholding thing? To find her? See if she’s okay?”

“Elias might be able to use that to track us.” A sigh. “And...if she’s dead, I don’t want to have to see her corpse.”

“Right. Tea, then?”

“What? Martin, I don’t- ” Another sigh. “I didn’t want to bother you.”

“Then you shouldn’t have been ranting about Shakespeare in my ear.” He rolls his eyes. “What was that about, anyway? Should I even ask?”

Jon’s quiet for a long moment, but he reaches over and taps Martin’s hand. Martin immediately flips his hand over, Jon takes it in his, and they both sigh in unison. God knows they’ve spent the past two weeks like this, God knows they’re going to keep doing this. Hopefully in a bigger bed soon. Soon-ish. Hopefully. 

Martin yawns. Jon yawns. The cows outside climax. Martin grimaces, and Jon quietly snorts. 

“I thought Hamlet was cool,” Martin eventually says. His voice cracks. Jon tries, and fails, to muffle a judgemental groan. “It was school! I thought he was cool and goth.”

“Hamlet is not goth.”

“Hamlet is kind of goth.”

“Sure, and Cleopatra was Egyptian.”

Martin tiredly, yet widely, grins. “So he was!”

And Jon turns his head to stare at him. “What? No! She was- ” He sighs and looks back to the ceiling. “Sure, Martin, Hamlet is goth. That’s what made him cool?”

“I mean, yeah, kinda. I wanted to be goth when I was younger. Thought all the cool kids were.”

Jon lightly elbows Martin in the side. “You’re goth now. Look at you, with a name like Martin Blackwood and living in the Scottish highlands with an entity of fear.”

“I’m hipster now, Jon, get it right.”

“Yes, of course, my apologies.”

Martin laughs, just a little, because it is still two in the goddamn morning. “I’ll forgive you someday, you bastard.”

Jon lets out a huff of a laugh through his nose and is quiet for another moment. 

“I was Hamlet in a school production once,” he eventually says. “University. Georgie made me do it. Said she didn’t want to audition alone.”

Martin smiles. “Lemme guess, she didn’t get in, but you did.”

“God, I wish, no, she played Gertrude. Kept calling me ‘son’ out in public.”

Martin snorts, and Jon faintly smiles, eyes glimmering in the pale moonlight. 

“You’re not nearly goth enough to be Hamlet,” Martin says, and Jon indignantly nudges him with a sharp, boney elbow. 

“I’m plenty goth. Got the boots to prove it.”

“Right, ‘cause all goths wear Doc Martins.”

“They do! I read it online somewhere.”

Martin fully laughs at that, and Jon deigns to let a chuckle out. God, his laugh is beautiful. Rough, rusty, disused, gorgeous beyond all belief. Naive Archival Assistant Martin used to dream of hearing the elusive Jonathan Sims Laugh. Now he gets it whenever Jon isn’t moping. It’s nice. 

“Right.”

Jon _'hmmph's_ and shifts closer, rolling onto his side so he can rest his head on Martin’s chest. “Exclusionist.”

Martin lets go of Jon’s hand and loops that arm around his torso, hugging him ever-so-slightly closer. Jon’s warm. Martin, as a rule, isn’t anymore. It’s nice to have a personal heater. 

He hums. “Whatever, nerd, ‘m gonna have to shove you into a locker now.”

“Oh, no, whatever shall I do?”

“Gimme your lunch money and, uh, the answers to last night’s math homework.”

Jon tutts. “Now, see, that’s a mistake. I was horrible at math.”

Martin can relate. “Was it ‘cause you’re gay?”

“How did you know?”

“Personal experience.”

Jon’s huffy laugh is warm against Martin’s chest, and, God, if they could be like this any other time than two in the morning. Most nights like this end in silence, or Martin gently reminding Jon that he’s alive and not still trapped in the Lonely, or Jon reminding Martin that he’s alive and not still trapped in the Lonely. Last week’s Caesar rant ended with Jon slinking to the other room to reread one of Martin’s terrible new poems a couple hundred times until he fell asleep on the dingy loveseat. 

If Martin were more awake, he’d probably use his genius brain to connect the dots in Jon’s little speech. Something about letting people die, pushing people away, being a complete and utter bastard of a man for forever. But he’s sleepy, so he’s going to sleep. As soon as Jon calms down. Because that’s how these things have to end. 

Despite the rules, Martin’s eyes drift closed of their own accord, and he starts silently starting the meditation up again. Jon lies still, so still, against his side, breath even for once. 

The cows outside finally start going to bed themselves, the horny little bastards. 

Back in London, Elias or Jonah Magnus or whoever he is is probably plotting, because he sucks and never sleeps. Basira is looking for Daisy, whether she’s alive or not. Probably alive, because Daisy didn’t die in the coffin. Not going to die now. Not for Jon, anyway, no one dies for him. He doesn’t decide whether they do or not. Tim died because he was hurt beyond anything Martin could even hope to think about understanding. Sasha died because she was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Martin would’ve died because he was a fucking idiot. It’s not a matter of dying for someone or sending someone to their deaths, because death is inevitable for everyone in the end and everyone has their own times, and there’s nothing anyone can do to prevent it except maybe the End’s avatars, but they all suck, anyway. And Jon can hear these thoughts, Martin knows, and maybe he understands the Hamlet stuff a bit even while exhausted beyond all belief. Whatever. Two in the morning. 

Jon shifts slightly closer and slings his leg over both of Martin’s, almost definitely totally asleep. Maybe. Whatever. They’re going to talk in the morning, definitely, then Martin’s going to go to town to pick up groceries while Jon keeps working on the garden he swears is going to work out in the end, then they’ll meet back up and end up back in bed and cuddle because Jon really loves it and Martin really loves Jon. 

“Love you, too,” Jon murmurs, barely even saying a thing above a breath, and it’s all Martin can do to hum before dropping off for the second time that night. 

**Author's Note:**

> My podcast tumblr is [here!!!](https://petermeetpeter.tumblr.com/)
> 
> I love talking to people, so if you want to, please comment or come by my blog or something!


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